Economy

The major market tops I have left out include 2007 and 2000 because they bore little resemblance to the current setup technically – though they provide very similar lessons once the top was in place – i.e., in the nature of the subsequent sell-off. In 2000, almost all focus was on bubble tech stock indices rather than the broader S&P500 (in fact – while tech crashed, does anyone realise there was a massive rally in neglected value stocks for most of 2000 and even 2001?) As well, the 2007 was unlike any of the scenarios discussed here because bond yields were falling steeply once the top was forming.

In Florida, tomato pickers have been locked in box trucks under the watch of armed guards; in North Carolina, pregnant workers have been exposed to pesticides during harvest and birthed babies with missing limbs; in Michigan, children as young as six have been found laboring in blueberry groves. Those are marquee cases that garner national media, shining the spotlight on the most egregious abuses. In relative terms, suits like Villalobos are mundane, but they are also ubiquitous, filed with a frequency that suggests the most pervasive and insidious abuse faced by farmworkers is the kind Villalobos encountered: the blatant disregard of labor laws governing wages, safety, and health. This type of abuse is most typically seen in fields managed not by farmers but by farm-labor contractors, many of whom started out as farmworkers themselves.

According to legal precedent, the Fourth Amendment — the right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures — does not apply along the border. By the way, the government contends the Fourth-Amendment-Free Zone stretches 100 miles inland from the nation’s actual border.

The fact that A. J. Bos felt confident enough to spend millions of dollars on the initial construction phases of his CAFO before resolving a legitimate legal challenge or securing all required permits demonstrates both the profound entrenchment of the industrial livestock system and the power of its proponents and allies. But what’s remarkable about the Traditions Dairy case is that despite the long odds, an extremely dedicated, well-organized group of community members was able to successfully defend the public interest.

Chemical companies churn out billions of tons of acrylate each year, usually by heating propylene, a compound derived from crude oil. “What we’re interested in is enhancing both the economics and the sustainability of how acrylate is made,” said Wesley Bernskoetter, assistant professor of chemistry at Brown, who led the research. “Right now, everything that goes into making it is from relatively expensive, nonrenewable carbon sources.”

To help end the ivory trade, Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra of Thailand had opened the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species conference (CITES) earlier this month by pledging to end trading in ivory in that country, which the World Wildlife Fund said was previously the world’s largest unregulated market for that product.

The state-controlled Southern Weekly newspaper, citing court documents, said three men were sentenced to life in prison in Jiaxing last November for procuring dead pigs to sell their meat. It says the men and their group bought 77,000 dead pigs in a period of more than two years.

Local officials also told Southern Weekly that the city lacked the facilities to dispose properly of dead pigs. Hog farming is a major business in Jiaxing.

Gold & Silver

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